How is your back used in a baseball swing – Hanley Ramirez

Hanley Ramirez is going to the disabled list with a back injury. Although we’ve covered back injuries before, I thought it would be cool to look at how the back is used when you swing a baseball bat.

Hanley is having an awful year at the plate, so it is interesting that the back can play such a pivotal role in swinging a bat.

There is a great degree of physics and physiology that goes into the batting swing, but we’re going to look at what specifically happens to a person’s back when they swing the bat.

Where you aware that the key to a successful swing is called trunk coil? Yep, the trunk coil is your body winding up the mid-section to store energy for the swing. As the swing progresses, the back releases this kinetic energy through a step to the front foot, which places more than twice your body weight into the swing.

The trunk coil is an effective measurement of the back muscles used during a baseball swing. These include: